Herb Transformation Art.
The moment Xu Ziqing looked at it, the three characters seemed to stamp themselves directly into his mind, making him stagger backward and nearly fall.
Old He laughed heartily. “Looking at it that way consumes far too much mental energy. Not advisable, not advisable.”
Xu Ziqing looked embarrassed. “I don’t know what happened. I only looked at the name of the cultivation method, and suddenly I felt dizzy.”
Old He said, “Naturally. Don’t be fooled by how thin this booklet is. It was copied by a powerful cultivator of great attainment, so the strokes naturally carry that expert’s spiritual power. You haven’t even drawn qi into your body yet. Seeing it for the first time, you were overwhelmed by that spiritual energy.” At this point, he warned him, “If you have the opportunity to encounter other cultivation methods in the future, you must be extremely careful and never act rashly. If your ability is insufficient and you recklessly try to cultivate a profound method, you may injure yourself instead.”
“The expert who wrote this one had gentle spiritual power, which is why I dared let a complete beginner like you read it. But not every powerful cultivator has such a good temper. If you’re unlucky enough to encounter a cultivation method written by someone with a violent disposition, merely looking at its name could injure you!”
Xu Ziqing accepted the lesson and bowed. “Many thanks for Steward He’s guidance. This junior understands.”
Only then did Steward He wave a hand. “Take it and cultivate. The method for drawing qi into the body is recorded inside. And don’t look down on it. Although this Herb Transformation Art is only unranked, it’s among the better methods of its kind and is closely tied to our work tending spiritual herbs. Everyone in the Hundred Herbs Garden has practiced it for many years. Our foundations are limited, after all. Being able to learn it is already no small thing. If you’re dissatisfied, once your cultivation rises in the future, you can naturally seek another method.”
Steward He only gave such earnest instruction because he appreciated Xu Ziqing’s steady way of doing things. He genuinely wanted Xu Ziqing to establish himself in the Hundred Herbs Garden, so that when Steward He’s own lifespan eventually ended, he could pass the garden on to him.
Moreover, Steward He himself had initially practiced this very Herb Transformation Art, and after mastering it, had reached the fifth layer of Qi Refinement. Because he tended spiritual herbs exceptionally well, the family head later made an exception and bestowed a Human-rank cultivation method upon him, though it could not be taught to others at will. Old He told Xu Ziqing all this in the hope of encouraging him, so that Xu Ziqing might follow the same path.
Xu Ziqing was deeply grateful to Steward He as well. The old man might be strict, but his words had helped Xu Ziqing greatly. Having had no elder beside him to guide him since being born into this life, Xu Ziqing had come to hold Old He in considerable respect.
After finishing his instructions, Old He left Xu Ziqing to cultivate on his own, having no time to linger there. He only said, “If you run into something you don’t understand, think it through yourself first. If you truly can’t resolve it, then come ask me.”
Xu Ziqing naturally answered obediently, “Yes.”
After Old He left, Xu Ziqing closed the door and sat cross-legged on the bamboo bed.
He settled his mind and opened the booklet to the first page.
At the very beginning was a passage common to every method for drawing qi into the body.
“Sit quietly upon the meditation couch. Close your eyes and visualize. Draw the spiritual energy of Heaven and Earth through your spiritual roots and into your body, directing it straight to the dantian to nourish it.”
Xu Ziqing drew a deep breath and adjusted his posture. Following the illustration on the page, his hands naturally formed the prescribed seal. He slowly raised them and rested them upon his knees, then closed his eyes, calmed his mind, and began to visualize.
He emptied his thoughts and concentrated his attention between his eyes. Soon, his mind became completely blank, and he entered meditation. When he focused his thoughts on spiritual energy, five-colored motes of light suddenly appeared amid the boundless darkness before him, scattered sparsely and drifting in every direction.
Xu Ziqing vaguely understood that these were the five elemental types of spiritual energy between Heaven and Earth and deliberately tried to capture them. But how could matters in this world be so simple? Merely distinguishing the colors was difficult enough, let alone testing them one by one.
His luck had been poor in this respect. During the earlier spiritual-root test, the steward had announced the attributes of everyone else’s spiritual roots. Yet when Xu Ziqing’s turn came, the steward had only declared him “lowest of the low,” leaving Xu Ziqing completely unaware of his own attribute.
Normally, one could also learn a cultivation method’s attribute before practicing it. But not every method explained this. Unranked cultivation methods like this one were often of mixed attributes, meaning any type of spiritual root could practice them. Which kind of spiritual energy one could absorb most efficiently, however, was something each person had to discover for themselves.
Xu Ziqing therefore had no choice but to reach toward every mote of light in turn and see which type showed him the slightest favor.
Following the Five Elements of Heaven and Earth, he began with the golden motes. Xu Ziqing tried to establish some connection with them, but the golden motes instead moved farther away, so apparently that was not it. Next came the azure motes. This time things went much more smoothly. The moment he faintly beckoned to one, it rushed toward him impatiently, entered directly through the point between his brows, and slipped down into his dantian.
Xu Ziqing was delighted, knowing that he had at least succeeded in drawing in wood-attributed spiritual energy. Yet he still hesitated. If he did not test every type, he feared overlooking another possibility. So he tried the blue, red, and brown motes as well. Only then did he discover that aside from the azure motes, which were exceptionally eager to approach him, the other four types ignored him completely.
For a moment, he did not know whether to feel fortunate or inferior, and he sat there somewhat dazed.
Fortunately, Xu Ziqing had always been broad-minded. Since wood qi liked him so much, he thought he should return that affection in equal measure. From then on, he abandoned the other four types and concentrated entirely on absorbing wood qi.
Once he screened out the other four types, Xu Ziqing saw only azure motes. He watched them gather from one or two scattered points, to more than ten, then hundreds. As more and more converged, he absorbed them faster and faster. Gradually, Xu Ziqing entered the proper state, and his entire frame of mind became tranquil and clear.
The spiritual energy gathered in his dantian. Because it was wood-attributed, it carried a faint, gentle warmth filled with vigorous life force.
Absorbing spiritual energy was extraordinarily comfortable. It felt as though a gentle hand were endlessly soothing his entire body, or as though warm water were softly washing through his flesh, so pleasurable he almost wanted to moan.
Xu Ziqing had never experienced such pleasure before. It gave him an even deeper understanding of why everyone wanted to cultivate immortality… Even setting aside the benefits that came with successful cultivation, this comfort alone was enough to make anyone reluctant to stop.
This meditation lasted seven days and seven nights. When Xu Ziqing awoke, his entire body felt extraordinarily stiff.
He moved slightly, and his joints cracked in a rapid series of pops. When he tried to move again, he had barely raised an arm before it felt as though his skin were splitting apart.
Puzzled, Xu Ziqing opened his eyes and looked down. His body immediately went rigid.
His skin really was cracking!
His hands had originally been fair and slender, but now their surface was covered in a thick layer of hard black grime, like filth accumulated after several days without bathing. Just looking at it seemed enough to make him imagine the stench.
Across both his previous and present lives, Xu Ziqing was certain he had never been this filthy!
He had no time to savor the lingering sensation of meditation, much less rejoice over successfully drawing qi into his body. Xu Ziqing quickly got out of bed and headed outside to fetch water for a bath. The moment he stepped through the door, he happened to encounter Old He returning from the day’s work. Looking up again, Xu Ziqing realized the sky was already growing dark.
Old He stopped and looked at Xu Ziqing, his expression somewhat complicated.
He had never imagined that this young menial worker he had taken in would enter meditation on his very first attempt at practicing a cultivation method, much less remain in that state for seven full days and nights.
In the world of immortal cultivation, the speed at which one drew qi into the body was closely tied to the quality of one’s aptitude, and the same was true of how long one could remain in meditation. Xu Ziqing’s aptitude was lowest of the low. He should not have been able to enter meditation so quickly, much less truly draw qi into his body and begin expelling impurities from within it.
To enter meditation so quickly and remain there so long was something that, in the Haotian Small World, only those of high aptitude were said to have achieved.
Could the formation have made an error when testing his spiritual roots? Old He first wondered. But after another thought, he decided otherwise. The only possibility now was that Xu Ziqing had been born exceptionally compatible with this cultivation method, allowing him to grasp it so quickly.
Once Old He had roughly settled on an explanation, he did not think any deeper. He was willing to spend his days tending spiritual herbs precisely because he disliked inviting trouble. Whether or not the formation had been wrong, he had already taken in this menial worker. All he needed to do was let the boy work in peace.
So after glancing at Xu Ziqing, he barked, “Now that you’re awake, hurry up and wash yourself clean. You look disgraceful.”
Xu Ziqing assumed the filth covering him had displeased Old He. He smiled and hurried away to fetch water and wash himself, never noticing the fleeting look Old He cast at his back.
The hot bath was exceedingly comfortable, though scrubbing all the grime from his body took considerable effort. Xu Ziqing emerged leisurely from the tub, dried himself with a cloth, and changed into the brown short outfit kept in the Hundred Herbs Garden for its menial workers. His long hair was still half damp when a thought suddenly occurred to him. The small amount of spiritual energy in his dantian immediately circulated once through his entire body, and in an instant his hair was completely dry.
But the moment he finished, Xu Ziqing’s head suddenly spun. He fell backward into a seated position and spent quite a while catching his breath. Then his heart began to palpitate, while his dantian churned as though the spiritual energy inside had been thrown into turmoil.
Only after slowly evening out his breathing did Xu Ziqing smile bitterly. “As expected, I can’t act recklessly. I’ve only meditated for a few days, yet I already tried to use spiritual energy. I was far too overconfident.”
After thinking about it, he felt something was off, so he took out the Herb Transformation Art and examined it carefully again.
Sure enough, there was more after the section on drawing qi into the body.
It turned out that passing the threshold of drawing qi into the body merely meant learning how to attract the spiritual energy of Heaven and Earth. Spiritual energy that entered the body was still only spiritual energy and had to be accumulated repeatedly in the dantian. Once the dantian was full, one continued drawing in spiritual energy and compressing it without cease. When the dantian could finally hold no more, quantity would transform into quality: spiritual energy would become spiritual power, establishing a tiny source of spiritual power deep within the dantian. After that, newly drawn spiritual energy would continuously thicken the source, and what accumulated thereafter would be spiritual power. At that point, the first layer of Qi Refinement would be complete.
In other words, Xu Ziqing was still lingering at the threshold of becoming a cultivator. Only after establishing his spiritual source would he count as a true cultivator.
Further cultivation required opening the fifty-two acupoints along the Ren and Du meridians to attain the second layer of Qi Refinement. With every subsequent layer, another two meridians had to be opened, though the number of acupoints varied. Different cultivation methods also prescribed different orders for opening the meridians, producing different circulations of spiritual power within the body. Only upon reaching the ninth layer of Qi Refinement would another change occur.
For Xu Ziqing’s Herb Transformation Art, after opening the Ren and Du meridians, the next step was to open the Yin Linking and Yang Linking meridians among the Eight Extraordinary Meridians. But that would only come after he reached the second layer of Qi Refinement.